Visions of God and Ideas on Deification in Patristic Thought

This volume illustrates the complexity and variety of early Christian thought on the subject of the image of God as a theological concept, and the difficulties that arise even in the interpretation of particular authors who gave a cardinal place to the image of God in their expositions of Christian doctrine. The first part illustrates both the presence and the absence of the image of God in the earliest Christian literature; the second examines various studies in deification, both implicit and explicit; the third explores the relation between iconography and the theological notion of the image.
This is a very important collection of studies, from a first rate assortment of scholars, which will contribute further to the gradually growing recognition that deification is an issue of central importance for understanding not only Eastern Christian thought but the very nature of the Christian theological enterprise itself. - Dr Rowan Williams, University of Cambridge, UK